The former US ambassador to Ireland, Richard Egan, has warned
the publisher of an Irish American magazine she had “better
think twice before trying to influence American politics” as
“the Irish are not the only ones with long memories”.

Mr Egan, one of President Bush’s top fund-raisers, also
complained in a letter to the magazine of increasing anti-US
sentiment in the Irish media, and accused Irish political
parties of “dysfunctional behaviour”.

The former envoy wrote the letter to protest at alleged bias in
an article in the latest issue of Irish America, in which the
positions of Mr Bush and Mr Kerry on Ireland were laid out
side-by-side.

Earlier this month, he described his second year in Ireland was
“very, very, boring.” Speaking at a meeting of Irish American
Republicans in New York, he said that “anybody with aspirations
for the job should think twice”. He left the three-year
posting one year early late last year to work on the Bush
re-election campaign.